Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I recently had the opportunity to visit the Queensland research laboratory of Australia's largest information and communications technology research and development organisation, NICTA. NICTA is a not-for-profit company which began in 2003, with laboratories in New South Wales, Victoria, the ACT and Queensland. Most of the funding for NICTA is provided by the federal government, with each participating state and territory providing additional funding to support NICTA's presence locally.

NICTA's Queensland research laboratory was established in 2005. The laboratory is based at the University of Queensland in the Ryan electorate but draws on the capabilities of researchers at University of Queensland, Queensland University of Technology and Griffith University. The laboratory is funded primarily by the Queensland government with contributions matched from the Queensland partner universities and Commonwealth funding through NICTA.

My tour of NICTA's Queensland laboratory was initiated by University of Queensland academic and NICTA's Advanced Surveillance project leader, Professor Brian Lovell. Professor Lovell and his team recently won the prestigious ICT Research and Development prize for their face recognition technology, which improves the speed and accuracy of identifying faces for law enforcement, at the Asia-Pacific ICT Alliance Awards in Thailand. Working in collaboration with the Queensland government, the team created NICTA's Face Search Engine, which aims to improve face recognition in grainy, low-quality video footage. The search engine has the potential to save precious time in police investigations where CCTV footage is usually reviewed manually.

While facial biometric recognition is already used in Australia to verify the identity of someone when checked against a passport photo taken under finely controlled and cooperative conditions, NICTA's technology can identify 'persons of interest' using CCTV footage of a crowd. Professor Lovell told me that during a trial, the technology successfully pinpointed 11 out of a total 12 persons of interest in airport footage monitoring arrivals off seven jets.

The technology has already been installed in one Asia-Pacific country to manage border control and is also the foundation for a free iPhone app launched late last year that allows people to use their phones to photo and identify up to 50 people, or indeed their pets if they prefer.

Research and development in the information and communications technology field plays an important role in solving Australia's economic and social challenges, and is crucial to the growth and development of industry. In addition to their face search technology, NICTA's Queensland research laboratory is developing technology for use in infrastructure and transport systems to improve cost efficiency and productivity, as well as developing advanced networking and sensing systems for use in agriculture. The researchers are also developing new air traffic management systems which have the potential to revolutionise how air traffic is controlled, allowing for greatly increased flight densities without compromising on safety. NICTA's research in business process compliance ensures that the core activities of a business are aligned with relevant laws, regulations and guidelines. This important work is particularly relevant to governments that are looking to cut government red tape by decreasing regulatory burdens on business.

At a national level, NICTA is developing a range of innovative technologies as well as providing tools to government and industry which reduce regulatory burdens and costs but at the same time improve productivity. NICTA tells me that the economic impact of this work has been independently estimated at some billions of dollars every year.

This is groundbreaking research which is being undertaken in our own country, but sadly we will not be able to stay ahead of the field if governments both state and federal do not commit to providing adequate research and development funding. Great ideas are never enough. We must be prepared to invest in our Australian researchers so they can develop their work from the research stage all the way through to the development and commercialisation phase.

I would like to thank Professor Lovell; Professor Simon Kaplan, the Director of the Queensland Research Laboratory; and NICTA's Liz Jakubowski and Rob Fitzpatrick for taking the time to meet with me and discuss the leading-edge research taking place at NICTA's Queensland Research Laboratory. I must also congratulate Professor Lovell and the Advanced Surveillance Project team on their outstanding success at the Asia-Pacific ICT Alliance Awards. I implore this government as well as the Queensland government to continue and even increase their support for the future development of this extraordinary research.